


And I’m safe now, underneath this oak tree, with you beside me (i'm covered by nature)

by stvrshine



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Fluff, I'm Bad At Tagging, I'm so sorry, Internal Conflict, Kid Fic, Kid!Harry, M/M, Tumblr Prompt, You're Welcome, i cried while writing this because i'm on my period, its so fluffy I'm gonna die, kid!louis, larry stylinson - Freeform, loosely based off a prompt i saw, mentions of Liam, mentions of Niall, mentions of abuse, mentions of tomlinson family, pure fucking fluff, they both live in holmes chapel, trigger warning, tw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-29
Updated: 2014-09-29
Packaged: 2018-02-19 05:01:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,231
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2375531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stvrshine/pseuds/stvrshine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry is very jealous of Louis' tree in his front yard.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And I’m safe now, underneath this oak tree, with you beside me (i'm covered by nature)

**Author's Note:**

> ****If you're triggered by mentions of any kind of abuse, I would suggest that you don't read this.*****
> 
> This is loosely based off this prompt: http://otpprompts.tumblr.com/post/96783005330/imagine-your-otp-as-kids-in-a-preschool-and
> 
> I'm PMSing and i dont know what happened okay i'm sorry
> 
> Title is from Little Bird by Ed Sheeran ♥ (i flipped the two lyrics sue me)

 

Harry was every parent’s dream. (And Anne was told this countless times.)

 

As an eight year old boy, Harry was the epitome of sunshine. He woke up every morning with a shiny white smile, listened to his teacher, got one hundreds on every assignment, won all the spelling bees, was the star of everything he was involved in; and when school was out, he would walk straight home like a big boy all by himself, put his shoes by the door, give Mummy a kiss, do his homework with no fuss, eat dinner, watch a movie, and then go to bed at his normal bedtime, which was 8:00. Harry was polite, Harry was kind, and Harry was patient. Harry said please and thank you to the lady with the snacks at school, and Harry always shared his toys with someone else.

 

 “Harry! Time to get up for school!”

 

Harry yawned and stretched out his arms. Winter break was over and today was Monday! Harry was so excited to get back to school and hear everyone’s stories about what they did within the two weeks they had off. He bit back a smile in between his little red lips and jumped out of his bed, running downstairs to his breakfast. His usual breakfast was oatmeal with bananas and some toast, special-made by his Mummy.

After he was done eating, she picked out his clothes; a sweater and some jeans, and helped him get dressed and ready to leave. She waved him goodbye as he walked out the door with his backpack on his back and his snack baggy gripped in his little hand.

In the past, he noticed every family in the neighborhood had little brick houses with wrap-around porches and trees, lots of trees. He glanced at the big tree in the front yard of the house directly across the street from his own. He always wanted that tree in his own yard, and he was green with envy of it. The people in that little brick house did not really take care of it. If Harry lived there, he would water it every day, and use that bag of magic dirt that Mummy used in her garden to help the plants grow. But Mummy told him to never be sad about something you don’t have, and be happy for the person who does have it. So, he never said anything about it, but he did wish that family would take care of the tree. Maybe those people did not know about plants, or trees, or how to make things grow.

He figured he could walk to their house one day and teach them about it.

The walk to his school was not bad with some of the school kids trailing behind and in front of him. They all had a race, and Harry got third place while that tiny Irish kid got first place; though he always got first place because he was on the town football team and he was used to running a lot.

The teacher, Ms. Johnson, greeted all of them as the students entered the class room and put their belongings away in their cubbies. Harry thought Ms. Johnson was very pretty and reminded him of his Mummy, but girls have cooties, so he never admitted it to the rest of his friends. He sent a smile her way and hung up his backpack in his cubby quickly, so he could have a turn at playing before the day begun.

Fifteen minutes of playing went by fast, and Ms. Johnson called them all over to the carpet to share their stories about winter break. He glanced about the room, counting twenty kids sitting criss-cross-apple-sauce on the floor. But Harry noticed there was someone missing. He counted once more, making sure he did not miss anyone this time. There were supposed to be twenty-one kids, because he counted them himself when he made Halloween cookies for the whole class a couple months ago. So who was missing?

Ms. Johnson took attendance, making tiny tally marks next to the people who were all present, and Harry waited for someone to call out _“not here!”_ after someone’s name.

 

“Bradley Patterson?”

 

“Here!”

 

“Liam Payne?”

 

“Here!”

 

“Harry Styles?”

 

Harry concentrated so much that he forgot to say _“here!”_ when she called his name, and that made everyone laugh. “Sorry, Ms. Johnson,” he whispered, blushing.

 

“Louis Tomlinson?”

 

“Is Louis here?”

 

“No, Ms. Johnson!” a girl with black hair piped up.

 

Louis was the kid with the sick tree in the front yard. Louis was the kid who barely spoke up and barely participated in class; the kid who was in the background of every activity the class was involved in.  Harry frowned because he realized Louis was the kid who lived across the street from him in that little brick house with the dying tree.

And Harry did not think about it too much, because he was sometimes sick in the past and he had to stay home from school once or twice. He mentally started to focus again on what Ms. Johnson was teaching.

The rest of the school day passed by, and he walked home with the rest of the kids trailing behind and in front of him, and he inspected Louis’ house from a distance on the sidewalk, standing in his driveway. He waited for someone to walk in, or someone to walk out, but no one did after three minutes, and then his mummy walked outside to ask him what he was doing, and then he apologized and quickly skipped inside to the smell of freshly baked cookies.

A couple days went by, and there was no sign of anything Louis. And a couple more days went by, and there was still no sign. Harry was starting to get impatient. Of course, he always wished them good health when someone was sick. He would sign a short message on the get well card that Ms. Johnson passed around the class, and when they would get back, he would make sure to be extra nice to them that week.

This, however, was different. Harry was anxious about Louis. Usually everyone would come back within one or two days. But it was almost a whole week now. Harry began to try to reason out why he could be absent for so long. He did not want to ask Ms. Johnson, because that would be rude and invade his privacy, so he figured he could just think about it. So, he did.

Since Louis was always in the surroundings of everything, he furrowed his eyebrows, thinking long and hard about Louis, taking in his appearance and how he acted towards all the other students.

A flash appeared in his mind, and he remembered Louis seemed to always come to school with bruises on his arms (from falling and tripping on stuff, Harry assumed, because he sometimes fell and scraped his knee a lot on the street gravel), and sometimes Louis would fall so hard that he would get bruises on his face that would not go away for days. And Harry was starting to worry, because what if he fell really really, really hard this time and was seriously hurt? What if he broke his arm, or his leg, or both of his arms and legs, and he could not walk or do his homework or play with toy cars or return to school ever again?

And it was then that he realized that there were sometimes yells and screams coming from Louis’ house, but everyone yells, right? Even Harry gets yelled at sometimes, though not all the time, because Harry tried to be the very best boy he could possibly be. He imagined Louis being a bad boy, but he could not. Louis was too quiet to even raise his hand in class. And even though his house was across the street, sometimes you could hear them down a couple blocks, too.

But this whole time Louis was gone, there were no screams or yells. Everything was silent, and everything was eerie. (Ms. Johnson taught the class that word during Halloween time.) Harry thought it felt like Halloween again because the house looked haunted. Louis’ parent’s car was gone and so was Louis.

Maybe Louis moved.

Harry felt a pang in his heart that sank to the bottom of his little tummy, and his throat became scratchy, and tears prickled at the corners of his eyes. He wished he could have gotten to know him better, and Harry _tried_ , he really did, to get to know everyone in the class. But Louis was _always_ in the background and Harry did not pay enough attention and it was his entire fault because maybe he could have invited him over and let him listen to silence for a while or gave him some band aids to put over his bruises and cuts or gave him a freshly baked cookie again like Halloween; dang it, he would give Louis as much as he wanted, a whole batch or a whole basket with wrapping paper and a big bow just for him. He wanted to knock on that red door with the gold plated 3-0-2 on the front and ask why he was gone for so long but he knew no one would answer because no one was home and why did Harry not knock on the door before this all happened so maybe he could stop the constant yelling from his house and make Louis smile with all of his teeth and maybe even his parents could smile too and everything would be okay again.

Harry clutched onto his blue pillow case and cried and cried and cried himself to sleep, because Year 3 was so stressful when you had to worry about why students were absent, and if every school year was like this, he was absolutely positively _doomed_.

 

 

On the nineteenth of January, it was a Monday, and it felt like Antarctica outside. Harry’s mummy made him bundle up for the short walk to school, but he would comply with looking like a marshmallow as long as he did not get frostbite.

During the race to school, he made sure to avoid the street in case of ice. And that same Irish kid got first place, but Harry did not get third place. In fact, he was last. He stopped and stared at a car driving past them, but then hurried and ran as fast as he could when he heard the school bell ring for tardiness, and Harry Styles was never ever tardy.

Fortunately, he made it to school early, but did not have enough time to play before lessons begun. They were having a spelling quiz consisting of ten words they learned the past Friday and Harry was as prepared as a seven year old boy could be. Ms. Johnson handed out small halved pieces of paper to everyone, and she instructed them to put their folders up, obstructing the view of their desk so wandering eyes could not seek out answers.

The class was quiet as she read aloud the words, and then there was pencil scratching, and then silence again.

 

“Upon. She stumbled upon a cat on her way to school. Upon.”

 

Harry knew this one and wrote it down quickly.

 

“Strong. The man was strong and carried the woman across the river. Strong.”

 

He noticed the blonde haired girl next to him was struggling with this one, and he would have helped her if it was not against the rules.

 

“Object. Billy gave her a shiny red object and ran away. Object.”

 

A boy raised his hand and asked what the shiny red object was, making the majority of the class snicker. Ms. Johnson put a bad tally next to his name on the board.

Seven words later, the quizzes were all turned in and Harry was quite confident that he did well. The best part about getting good grades was when he could go home on Friday and hang it up on the fridge for everyone to see, and his Mummy would pat his head and tell him how proud of him she was.

 The class was currently working on writing about a time they went to a restaurant. Harry decided to use the time his whole family went to the local diner for breakfast on Christmas morning, and he thought it was the best day of his whole life.

A quiet knock at the door sounded, and made everyone turn around. Ms. Johnson traveled across the room from her desk, opening it.

On the other side of the door was a small, tattered boy in a thin jacket that was not suitable for the weather outside. It was Louis. And Harry’s heart panged again; excited that he was back, but wondering what happened to him the whole two weeks he was gone. There were butterflies in his stomach as Louis stepped in the room, going to his cubby and putting his backpack in.

Ms. Johnson gave him a small reassuring smile, like he was safe from wherever he was before. “Let’s all give a warm welcome back to Louis,” she announced, and everyone murmured little welcome’s while they settled back into the writing assignment.

Harry decided this was his only chance to fix what he did wrong.

He slowly got up out of his seat. Normally he would have to ask Ms. Johnson to get up because it was one of her class rules. Louis’ seat was on the other side of the room and Harry was making his way over, prepared to back his horrible actions up if Ms. Johnson scolded him.

 Louis was about to sit down, but he stopped as his eyes watched Harry like a hawk.

Harry carefully walked up to him.

 

“Hello,” Harry squeaked out.

 

Louis did not dare to answer.

Harry moved a bit closer, and Louis winced like he might have been afraid of Harry.

Everyone in the class was watching the two, and Ms. Johnson was not scolding Harry so far.

Harry had an idea, and it was not the best idea he thought of in his whole seven years of life, but it was something.

Harry opened his tiny arms and wrapped them around Louis tightly.

 

“Welcome back.”

 

Louis immediately twitched, trying to squirm away from him, but Harry insisted on this hug and he was going to give Louis this hug no matter what because hugs always make people happy and Louis deserved and needed to be happy after falling and tripping enough to be out for two weeks.

After a moment or two, Louis stopped moving around and accepted it.

They stood like that for a long, long time. It was the longest hug Harry had ever given.

The disheveled boy lifted his arm that was trapped by the taller boy’s body, and awkwardly placed his hand on his arm. The action made Harry smile, and finally pull away.

Louis’ face was not smiling like Harry’s, but his cheeks were rosy; and not just from the bruises.

Harry looked over at the class, who were staring them down like adults observing a museum painting.

 

“Give Louis a hug.”

 

The class did not dare to respond this time.

 

“Come on, don’t be shy now,” the brave boy prompted. “Let’s all give Louis a hug.”

 

Louis looked at Harry with a frightened look on his face, then quickly looking down at his feet.

Someone’s chair scratched against the floor, and a brown haired girl walked up to Louis, embracing him in her arms and then pulling away quickly. She sat back down in her seat with a blush scattered across her cheeks.

Two, three, and then four more people sat up and hugged Louis, all returning to their seats. And then it was the Irish boy, and then even the boy with many tally marks next to his name, and then the quiet girl, and Molly, and Liam, and then everyone took a turn, even Ms. Johnson!

Harry was so happy he was glowing inside, and by the end of it, Louis was even smiling a bit too, and Harry wanted to see that smile forever and ever and ever and ever. The class clapped their hands and cheered for Louis, the whole class was cheering for Louis! He was so delighted!

And when Harry returned home, he deemed that day the best day ever.

 

 

It was Saturday, and it was February fourteenth. Harry’s birthday was two weeks ago and he was finally eight years old, which means that he was old enough to get a new bike. And ride that bike, he did; all over the neighborhood, and even sometimes out of the neighborhood to the candy shop where he got gummy bears. And he always made sure to get an extra bag for Louis to drop off at his house.

He noticed the yelling decreased (another new word he learned) at Louis’ house over the next couple of months, and then it finally stopped. Harry was so happy that Louis could experience silence and quietness and sometimes he even invited Louis over for dinner so he could have more silence. Their sleepovers were anything but silent, though, sometimes they would stay up past their bed time, nine thirty, and watch movies and giggle about eight year old boy stuff. And he noticed when they’d go swimming in Harry’s pool in the summertime, the bruises were getting smaller and smaller and then they were not there.

And Harry thought about asking Louis why he was absent the two weeks of January, but then he decided against it, because Louis was happy and there was no reason to make Louis not happy ever again.

 

In September, school came back around, and it was the beginning of Year 4.

The trees were still lively and bursting with green leaves from the hot summer months.

He walked out the door with his backpack on his back and his snack baggy gripped in his slightly bigger hand.

Louis waved to him from his front porch, and sprinted down the steps and across the street carefully to meet Harry at his driveway.

Harry glanced over to Louis’ front yard as they went on their journey to school.

The tree in Louis’ front yard was blooming. It was healthy, upright, and dotted with tiny pink flowers.

 

“Hazza! Are you listening to me?!”

 

Harry snapped his head around to Louis. “Sorry, what’d you say?”

 

“I said let’s race! Loser has to clean both of our cubbies at the end of the year!” Louis challenged, already getting a head start as they ran past the other neighborhood kids.

 

“You betcha!”

 

He lost the race when he stopped to look at Louis’ front yard again. He was okay with losing and cleaning out Louis’ cubby because it was Louis, and Harry would do anything for Louis. And he even was okay with enduring the taunts Louis gave him when they reached the schoolyard.

 

He lost the race because he decided he was not jealous of the tree anymore.

 

He knew Louis deserved that tree more than anyone on this whole planet earth.

 

And he accidentally spent the whole rest of the day thinking how much money a million tree seeds would cost.


End file.
